St. Joseph Healthcare: Rupp Arena Branding Project

"Rarely does a hospital have the opportunity to reach consumers in a way that's irreverent and guaranteed to get a great deal of attention," says Lewis Communications CD Cindy Sargent. So true. Hospitals and comedy, or any sort of outrageou

Published on Mar 03, 2006

Editor's Pick

"Rarely does a hospital have the opportunity to reach consumers in a way that's irreverent and guaranteed to get a great deal of attention," says Lewis Communications CD Cindy Sargent. So true. Hospitals and comedy, or any sort of outrageousness, don't usually make for a good mix. But St. Joseph HealthCare, in Lexington, Ky., and Nashville's Lewis Communications found a way to align St. Joseph with the hotshot college basketball program at the University of Kentucky via a bizarre sponsorship at Rupp Arena, home of the Wildcats. The hospital branded one-quarter of the arena's interior on the concession level, according to Sargent, with 8-foot-high wall murals and a 14-foot-high 3-D blood bag. "Lexington has one of the strongest, most ardent college basketball fan bases in the country," she notes. "People in the area are total fanatics about UK basketball; what better way to show that a hospital understands and appreciates their dedication than to create 'ailments' that come only as a result of Kentucky basketball?" Moreover, the murals double as photo ops, she says. "People stop in their tracks to look at them, thinking, at first, that they're real. Once they get it, they usually want a picture of themselves in front of one." Photography by R. Jerome Ferraro, www.jeromepix.com.